


a spark

by dollsome



Category: Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-08
Updated: 2013-12-08
Packaged: 2018-01-03 23:17:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1074214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollsome/pseuds/dollsome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bertha, after Jane leaves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a spark

But then it's fire, fire, always someone with a stake or a knife  
ready to do her in. She is a spark about to go out.  
(Jeannine Hall Gailey, "Introduction to Witchcraft")

* * *

 

He comes to me, to me, can you imagine that. It doesn’t happen often, and now: twice in one day. How strange, ha ha! He does not bring the plain girl with him this time. I think she must have escaped. Did she run? I think of her small feet [she has small feet, I noticed because I thought to look, my feet are big as a beast’s and so I am always on the lookout for small feet, which make me jealous] running small against the big gray stones, such hard stones, and then into the earth, with all its give and wetness. If there is one thing I miss it is the ground. I will even settle for this rank and seeping English ground. I have come to enjoy the sound of raindrops. She is so, so lucky. The plain girl running. What if I followed?  
  
Grace is not with me now. He’s sent her away. She is not sad to go, I can tell. She likes to escape from me. I am a thing to be escaped from. Does that break your heart? It breaks mine. Well, I hate her right back. The devil take her. My damned jailer. I hope she drowns in drink, like I tried to drown when he first turned mean. I hope she coughs out her whole heart into tiny blood pieces, and I’ll eat them. I might as well. She brings me my meals every morning and evening on a smooth-edged tray. I am in love with the sound of her coming. She brings me my meals even when it is raining. I listen to the rain and her footsteps and my blood sings! All the sounds! All the sounds at once! And now he stalks in and orders her away from me, and she is the only thing I have, so it makes sense. He is forever taking things away from me my husband. He would take me too if I’d let him.  
  
Run, run, run, plain girl, run.  
  
He does not say anything. This is new. He loves to hear himself talk. He loved that even in the beginning, in the days before he put me here. [They happened, they did! I used to wake up by his side, for I was his wife, you know. I am his wife. Mrs. Rochester, a name I have always liked the sound of more than Mason, so see, that was proper of me at least. Mrs. Rochester Rochester Rochester Rochester. Stay away, plain girl, don’t you start stealing from me too. I like the way you twitch and murmur in your sleep, it is so much more interesting than your daytime stillness. What are you hiding in there? And might I borrow some? I did not mean to rend your veil. I only like the little death of tearing things.]  
  
I am in one corner of the room. He is in the other. He does not come over here. He is not an idiot like my stupid brother. I loved him so when we were children and then he put me here, and I know he remembers my fear of the dark! Why would he do it, when I used to kiss his bruises and tell him tales I made up all on my own? How could he, with the sun still on his skin. I did not mean to make him bleed; I only wanted a taste of sun. No, no. That’s a lie and I am not a liar [I wear my madness on my breast, husband, not in my blood like you think and besides you used to like my breasts, some days I still feel your hot breath there], and so: I wanted him to scream. Wouldn’t you? Christ our Lord says to love the ones who hurt us but Christ the Lord did not spend ten years in this room. Ten years! I am so much older now, and probably ought to have children.  
  
I like the little girl downstairs. I would like to meet her. Sometimes I hear her singing – in French! – and I think that she would dance for me. I was rather like that when I was very small. I hope she is wise enough to stay out of rooms, but little dancers often aren’t.  
  
Why doesn’t he speak to me? He looks at me like he wants to kill me. If he tries I will take out his eyes with my fingernails. His eyeballs will stick in my fingernails. I don’t want him in me anymore but it seems a reasonable sacrifice.  
  
I will talk first.  _Did she go?_  I say. Like my fingernails in his eyes.  
  
If he strikes me I will strike him harder. I will strike him dead. This time he will be awake to feel it.  
  
He does not cross the room. So nor shall I. He looks at me like I am not his burden and in fact he hasn’t a clue how I got here. What a funny feeling it is. If I am not his burden then what am I?  
  
He makes a terrible noise then, a low groan, a dying beast’s cry. I cry out too, hating it. I am not used to it, my sounds are footsteps and raindrops and [because I remember it being a pleasant thing, and being a lady I am accustomed to pleasant things] laughter, even though no one will laugh with me and so I must do it all.  
  
He sinks to the floor like a disappointed child. He buries his head in his hands. His great shoulders shake with crying.  _Jane,_  he says.  _Jane._  That is her name. What a boring name. I would call her something else. Janes do not twitch at night.  
  
But I like this. Watching him cry. Not because he hurts but because this is it, exactly it, his shaking shoulders and his big breaths and that noise, that noise that is nothing and something like a laugh, it scrapes against my bones, it thrusts into me where I do not want it. I feel this! It is in the walls of this house!  
  
I have discovered the cure—  
  
We all must run far far away, ‘til the sun greets us and the heat licks our skin. The closest thing they have here is fire, and that can be very dangerous.  
  
 _Damn you,_  he says. At least it is better than Jane. He looks up at me. His face is wet. He looks even uglier. I remember when I was first told that I had to marry him and my insides shriveled up in disgust. But you do get used to him after awhile. Still, it seemed unfair. I was very beautiful at the time. Jane, plain Jane’s mirror told me that I am not now, but that is because they have put me in a room for ten years and it is hard to observe one’s toilette under such circumstances. I did not know it was ten years until my brother Richard told me. Ten years! No wonder my hair has grown so long. Though Grace does cut it sometimes.  
  
 _Damn you,_  I say back fairly. Believe me I have said worse to him before.  
  
I copy it just right, and he laughs. Laughs! He looks as if he cannot believe it either. But there is the laughter coming out of his mouth even as he cries.  
  
He is a very strange man my husband. I don’t think very many women would want him. Certainly not one in her right mind. For example: he will lock you up without a second thought and never touch you again. He always says I tricked him. Not as soundly as he tricked me [but I don’t say this we have never been very communicative]. I thought he only wanted my money, not to put me in this room. Which is unusual husbandly behavior. I have tried to kill him four times but it never goes well.  
  
 _Damn the pair of us to hell_ , he says,  _and thank God we had no children._  
  
 _Ugly children,_  I agree.  
  
He snorts.  _Look at you tonight. One could almost believe you sane. A charming conversationalist indeed._  
  
I do not think he understands what madness means. I could talk ‘til the moon came and then left again. [She may be there already.] Talking does not mean as much as he thinks.  
  
 _Come now, wife,_  he says, his eyes glinting.  _Wouldn’t you like to sink your teeth into my flesh and bite? Tear me up? You did as much to your poor brother._  
  
 _Come now, wife,_  he says.  _We are each other’s. Ever and after. Don’t be shy._  
  
 _You could bleed every drop from my veins,_  he says,  _and still you would not be my murderess; she already owns that title._  
  
 _You would only finish what she started,_  he says.  _As she started what you finished – by which I mean (you will not understand, of course, will you, slack-eyed thing, mongrel bitch, dear dear wife) my heart, my life, my soul. My Jane. Oh Jane. Oh Jane._  
  
Run, run, run, plain Jane, run to where he cannot find you. It’s not a room big enough for two. You would kick me in your sleep.


End file.
